Hand held blenders

[Diane]

I had a hopeless one Tesco's own brand. Lasted 5 weeks!

[Tigger]

Well - surprise, surprise. I'm not going to recommend the James Martin one, although I'm sure it is excellent. For me, the king of hand blenders has to be Bamix. I've had one for years and it's exceptionally good. The other point of recommendation is that when they introduce a new gadget (like the grinder attachment or the shredder) they always fit every past model so you don't have to upgrade your original piece of kit.

I'm sure James' blender is good. I do have in excess of 20 of his saucepans, 3 sets of knives and an apron, all of which are wonderful. I also have a mixer which is useless, but don't tell him I said so!

We bought a student friend of ours the Sainsbury Basic stick blender, in the belief that he was likely to lose it one way or another, but it's survived and he's very happy with it. As he's used to using our Bamix, that's quite a sound recommendation in respect of price and function.

[richard p]

"I do have in excess of 20 of his saucepans, "

why???? or do you only wash up once a month?

[peter]

"I do have in excess of 20 of his saucepans, "

why???? or do you only wash up once a month?

Perhap she wears some of them?

Runs and hides.

[glallotments]

"I do have in excess of 20 of his saucepans, "

why???? or do you only wash up once a month?

I couldn't find room in my kitchen for that many!

[Stephen]

Hi Gallotments
After using something else for the past 20+ years (can't remember what it was but it did decent service. It went because i had repaired the bowl and a lid but once the motor or drive was going as well...)
I have just bought a Kenwood wizzard pro hand blender on discount at Waitrose. Ok but small good for a single person or sauces.

[Catherine]

What ever you do be careful the first time you use it or you will be wiping the contents of the pan off your worktops, tiles, kitchen cupboards, etc, trust me I am speaking from experience. But seriously we love ours, dont know what make it is though but we are on our second one and use it all the time.

[richard p]

ive always thought theyed be worth a try for stirring gloss paint when its separated out.

[oldherbaceous]

Dear Richard p, behave, but what a good idea.

[Tigger]

Why have I got more than 20 saucepans? Well, I like to have all the different sizes and different depths and then I have favourite ones, so I've always got duplicates of those. I've got them hanging on a rail, French style, so they don't take up any cupboard space.

[Primrose]

We have a Phillips - not sure of the model number but it's a fairly robust one and one of the most useful gadgets in our kitchen for blitzing up soups, tomato purees, etc. The only advice I'd offer is not to buy one of the smaller cheaper models but to go for a more powerful model. If you're great soup / purree makers a more powerful one will get quite a lot of work and will probably last longer.

[Catherine]

Just checked ours and it is a Braun 300 and works perfectly well.

[John]

Hello again GLA
Another little wrinkle - when you're blitzing soup only do one half of the pan then you will finish up with a thick base with some vegetable and meat bits in it. If you do the whole lot it will turn out as a thick mush, like baby food!

John

[glallotments]

Hi all,
Thanks for all the advice. I ended up buying a Phillips without whisk as I have an electric whisk already. All your advice meant I avoided the cheapest blenders. I ended up buying the Phillips because Amazon had a good deal on them. Now it has arrived - yesterday in fact - I need to try it out and will take heed of all the advice so that I don't end up redecorating the kitchen. Must admit they are bigger than I imagined.

[glallotments]

Made my first batch of hand blended soup and it was brill! No splashing and whizzed very quickly. And I didn't whizz it all John so got the bits in it too!